Fraternity
by Angelfirenze
Summary: Eames. She was his reason for refusing the ICW's offer -- whatever it was, whatever it would have gotten him. He was staying for her just as he knew she would for him.
1. Opportunities

**Opportunities**  
_By Angelfirenze_

**Disclaimer:** Whedon and Wolf own all. Bayside. "They're Not Horses, They're Unicorns.". Victory, 2007.

**Summary:** Eames. She was his reason for refusing the ICW's offer -- whatever it was, whatever it would have gotten him. He was staying for her just as he knew she would for him.

**Timeline:** L&O:CI, during Bobby's suspension, then fast forwarding to the hell on Earth that will be the season premiere. Buffy the Vampire Slayer, post-season seven, but none of the season eight comics have happened.

_...How all the choices you've made drive you insane. I wish we'd never met._

Bobby ran a hand over his face, giving the bespectacled man before him another once over. The man had come all the way to his apartment, was seemingly irreverent to Bobby's haggard appearance, and was offering him a job.

"I understand that you may not wish to leave your current tenure with the New York City Police Department, but -- "

Goren gave a dry, humorless laugh and Giles found himself rather confused. Goren seemed to notice this -- in fact, he appeared to be an extremely perceptive man, by all rights -- and let his arm drop down to the table before he elaborated for Giles' benefit.

"I'm on suspension. I -- " Bobby clamped his mouth shut, running his hand over it again. He wasn't willing to discuss it any further than that with a complete stranger. Not when he couldn't even discuss it with Eames.

Contrary to his expectations, Mr. Giles actually smiled. "Ah, er, yes. Your suspension. We are quite aware of that, Detective, as well as your very successful partnership with Detective Eames. As it would stand, she's currently working with a replacement, am I correct?"

Bobby's face darkened. He didn't bother to tell this man, Giles, that he didn't think anything about the situation was worth smiling about.

Mr. Giles continued as though he weren't practically being glared at and shuffled his papers into a more neat stack than they already were.

"Yes, well -- as I stated earlier, Detective, we at the International Council of Watchers are extremely interested in your services, suspension or no."

Goren fought the urge to scowl, "Which is interesting considering that during the last half-hour or so, you still haven't told me a thing about what the International Council of Watchers _does_, much less why you'd require me."

This time, Mr. Giles' smile was more restrained. "You attended Oxford and Yale, yes? Obtained degrees in Psychology, Criminology, and the Criminal Sciences, in general?"

At Goren's terse nod, Giles continued, "What we are offering, Detective, is a chance for you to do far more than dangle yourself on the line again and again for a department that doesn't seem all that happy to have you there. From our background check -- if you'll forgive this, particularly since I'm sure you'll try to find us as soon as I leave -- this isn't your first suspension, though it is the most serious, and when you _are_ on your best behavior, they still treat you as though you've contracted some dreadful disease they're terrified of catching -- unless what you've caught is the perpetrator of some heinous crime."

Giles smirked, then, "Then they're all for you."

Goren sighed heavily, irritated now at being reminded of his tightrope walk with the brass and his colleagues on a daily basis.

Then he cut to the point, "I'm not leaving Eames. She -- I'm not leaving Eames."

His own expression was closed, he knew, and he complemented it with folding his arms.

Giles could see this situation wasn't going to turn in his and the Council's favor, so he simply sighed and stood, making sure to leave his card.

"Please feel free to contact us if you ever have need." With that, Rupert Giles let himself out.

Bobby had listened when the man told him he wouldn't find anything, he was guessing, on a computer about the International Council of Watchers, but all the same he took a walk over to the library and spent hours looking through the stacks, trying to find at least _something_ that would point him in the right direction.

He got a lot of faint hints, but nothing that would form a cohesive picture. Frustrated, he slammed a book harder than he'd intended, earning a sharp glare from the last librarian on call at the moment (the others had all long gone and Bobby was only allowed to stay as a courtesy from being an extremely frequent face), who rightly complained, "Detective, you of all people know better than that! That's a very, very old book you're abusing in such a way!"

Bobby winced, immediately contrite. This particular librarian always reminded him of his mother before she was ill, which always gave him a horrible twinge in his chest.

"I'm sorry, I'm just...I'm frustrated. I mean, I _knew_ -- they told me I wouldn't find anything about it, but...do you have any idea what the International Watcher's Council is, by any chance?"

Bobby tried not to clench his fist as the irritation of not being able to find _anything_ rode over him.

Sure enough, the librarian shook her head, sighing, "I'm sorry, Detective Goren, I haven't the slightest idea what that is. You're welcome to come back tomorrow to continue looking, though, so long as you remember to treat the books kindly."

Bobby nodded, again contrite as he gathered his things and finally left after waiting for her to do the same. "I - yeah, I'll - I'll be back tomorrow. I just haven't slightest idea where to look."

"Well, you know what they say -- it's always the last place. Good evening, Detective," she said as she got in her car and drove off.

Bobby walked home, kneading his forehead and thinking hard, almost oblivious of the rain that began to fall.

By the time he got home, Rupert Giles' card was soaked through, the ink runny and illegible.

Goren gritted his teeth. "Great. Just -- " he pitched in into the trash can and resolved to try to forget about the whole thing. He had more important things to worry about.

Eames. She was his reason for refusing the ICW's offer -- whatever it was, whatever it would have gotten him. He was staying for her just as he knew she would for him.

***

St. Vincent's Hospital  
Intensive Care Unit  
11:54 pm

Bobby stared downward at Eames' comatose body, everything in him willing her to wake up. He was crying, he knew, but he didn't care. She'd lost a lot of blood and his Rhesus factor prevented him from giving her any. He stared unerringly at the bandage on her neck and wondered what the hell he was going to do if she left him.

4:12 am

In the end, they'd forced him to let go of her hand. Her body was taken to the morgue and he took it upon himself to call the Eames family and tell them that she'd never regained consciousness, that she hadn't hurt at all.

He wished to any and everything that he could think of in this world or any other that he could go with her.

Bobby's Apartment  
8:23 pm

Barek, of all people, had been the first person on his doorstep. Logan had followed shortly thereafter with Deakins and Carver. They'd stayed the longest, Deakins and Carver needing to return to their families, but both Logan and Barek were either retired or had taken leave from the FBI field office she was now assigned to.

Barek had broken rank on impulse and given him a hug. It was then that he'd finally caved, crying as though his heart had been ripped out.

What he would say if he had been able would have been that it wasn't just his heart, but everything. He was hollow, gutted -- someone had taken Ea -- Alex from him and she was never coming back.

He cried and felt as if he were dying, too.

_...I was just a lost soul who needed a home, I was filling a void with you..._

The next time a representative from the Council showed up on his doorstep, it was a woman he felt was young enough to be his daughter. She was quite short, he noticed immediately, but didn't comment on it. He didn't care to do more than step back and let her cross the threshold, already knowing but not knowing why she was here.

Her first words were her name, Buffy Summers, and then condolences on the loss of...Alex -- he'd quickly corrected her and she'd surprised him by smiling sadly and nodding before repeating Alex's name.

"You won't forget her, I promise," Buffy Summers said with a certainty that told Bobby that she'd lived through what he had more times than she cared to remember and Bobby longed to ask her how on earth she was still here.

Buffy sat herself down at Bobby's kitchen table and Bobby would have kicked himself if he'd had the energy to care about being rude.

He slumped in the seat across from her and brought his hand to his mouth, pressing it against his teeth before bringing it back down and taking a wild shot in the dark.

"Let me guess -- International Watcher's Council."

Buffy frowned a smile and sighed, "Yep, that's us -- and you looked and you didn't find anything, but then your whole world was turned upside down so what the hell did you care?"

Bobby deflated further if that was possible and didn't even bother nodding.

Buffy sighed. "I'm not going to tell you it'll get better. That's a damned lie. It never gets better, Bobby. It just gets livable, so that's what you've got to do. If you loved her half as much as I think you do, then you owe it to her because even her family can't love her like you do."

Bobby breathed inward before it burst out and he tried to breathe again, tried to speak, failed and failed again.

He brought his hands up and ran them through his hair before bringing them down over his scratchy face. He'd shaved for her funeral, but that was -- he didn't know. He didn't know anything anymore.

"What do you want from me?" He asked again, dead inside.

Buffy frowned earnestly now but didn't raise either eyebrow as she asked Bobby, "Let me guess: Giles came, dropped tantalizing little hints, but wouldn't just _say_ it's classified information, just that you wouldn't find anything and was generally a British pain in the butt?"

Bobby's scowl at the memory of -- was it last month? Last year? It was all so muddled in his head. God...

"And that answers my next two questions. Bobby, I'm not going to ask you to join us if you feel like staying with the NYPD. You've got a fantastic resume that anyone with a brain would jump at -- the NYPD got lucky, though. They don't know it, but at the same time, you just don't want to leave your memories of Alex behind."

Bobby blinked then and everything in the vicinity was blurry and Buffy breathed, herself, before reaching forward and giving his much larger hand a gentle squeeze.

"You really think she'd leave you that easily?"

Bobby's breath hitched, a sob almost escaping before he forcibly clamped his mouth shut, but the tears still came.

Buffy squeezed Bobby's hand just a little bit more. "Don't leave her behind. Take her with you. It's your choice. You and I both know you don't want anything to do with the NYPD anymore. They split the two of you up and they did it without giving even the slightest bit of a damn. You don't have to do that again. Or go through it again. Take her with you."

This time when the International Council of Watchers came calling, Bobby accepted. He still didn't know what they did, but it didn't matter as long as what Buffy told him remained true.

_You're pulling out your teeth and I'm the Novocaine you pump in your cheek..._

END


	2. TripleSided Coin

**Triple-Sided Coin**  
_By Angelfirenze_

**Disclaimer:** Whedon and Wolf own all. The Decemberists. "The Rake's Song.". Hush, Rough Trade, 2009.

**Summary:** It was then that Bobby concluded that Mark Ford Brady had left his mark on more mothers than just his own. He didn't like to think that he had a passel of siblings running around in the world, but one was walking around here right under his nose.

**Timeline:** post-'Opportunities', because -- apparently -- this story's not finished with me, either. Note (a): While this takes place in the Season Eight time frame, nothing in it has happened. This continues to be AU.

**Notes:** **adoxerella** and I have been RP'ing some stuff in my story, 'Middle Son's' 'verse and given the way canon's going, I see no reason not to use it here. (*giggles like the madly amused B/A shipper that I am*). Apparently, **theantijoss** actually _is_ Joss. She or I, according to Dox. *blushes*

There's also my partner series, 'Understanding', specifically 'Splitting', but only one specific instance that happens in that story.

Also, since we know comparably little about Bobby's Army record, I'm using that to my advantage.

Triple-Sided Coin

Bobby had been in England an entire month before he met Xander. He remembers vividly that his eye had twitched -- he hoped even now he wasn't developing another nervous tic, like he really needed to add to the list. He remembers that his body had hummed with a strange familiarity that didn't seem logical at all because he'd never met the kid.

But he'd felt it. And it was the first thing he'd felt since Alex had died so he'd clung to it like a rope saving him from being swept away in the tide of grief still all too fresh.

Alex's family, out of some gesture he still couldn't figure out no matter how many hours he spent pondering it, had given him her shield to keep and sometimes he stared at it and cried and felt the chasm in his soul open just a little bit wider. He didn't know how to close it, how to even begin -- and so he read.

Rupert Giles, the irritating man from however long ago, had graciously given him full-run of the Council's library and it was full of so much information, he wished he could have set up a cot and mini-fridge and just stayed in there for the rest of his life.

But he knew Alex wouldn't have wanted that for him, so he met all the Slayers -- made a point of it -- and even their allies, who dropped by on occasion or when it was what everyone he now knew called 'apocalypse season'.

It was his first 'season' and Willow, a young redheaded woman he could tell was just like him at some core level -- she couldn't get enough information, couldn't stop even when it brought her heartache and grief because she just had to _know_ -- had reassured him.

"Eventually, you just get used to it and the research, Goddess, I don't even have to tell you how much fun that part is -- if not much else. But Buffy and Faith and sometimes Angel and Spike, depending on where everything's going down, they take care of it. Illyria, too. Connor, sheesh, you really have to meet everyone. I think if you gathered us all under one roof, we'd look like a graduating class. I should probably get around to telling you about everyone's nicknames and stuff, but you'll hear them soon enough. Gosh, everyone's so excited you're here, though -- they've seen your work and they're in awe, we're in awe -- sorry -- "

Willow paused then, forcing herself to breathe and apparently, counting under her breath. When she looked at him again, she was blushing.

"We, um, Xander, Buffy, and I -- we came up with this thing to make sure I remember to breathe while talking 'cause -- you know, an unconscious Willow is a bad Willow..."

Bobby had managed something approximating a smile for the first time in more than a month and she'd returned it with a bright one of her own before grabbing his hand without warning and dragging him over to the stacks. "You seriously need to see these. You'll love them and the best part is that unlike the stupid library, all -- "

Willow blinked at his flinching and frown and her eyes widened and then she sucked in a breath of horror. "Oh, my Goddess, I'm so sorry -- I forgot your mother was a librarian! Sorrysorrysorry!"

And she'd looked so contrite and upset, he couldn't help but forgive her and usher her forward and she'd breathed again and a breathing Willow was again a good Willow. She'd dragged him over to the shelves, acting like his way larger frame wasn't at all much of an obstacle.

"You just have to write down your name in the log book -- Giles calls it a ledger -- and the title of the books you're taking with you and the book -- it's done with magick, I should tell you -- keeps track of everything here and who's got what. I think it's more efficient just because of the mystical context. I don't think it's cheating at all. Some of the more important and rarer books we've put spells on so that if anyone tries to do anything to them or harms them, does something stupid like drop them in the bathtub, they get boils -- yeah we totally go with the plagues and stuff. _And it works, so ha!_"

He liked young Willow very much, he readily admitted.

But Xander was the one who intrigued him. It wasn't that they were anything alike -- the very idea made Bobby snort. He and Frank had been nothing alike, in most respects. Their only similarity -- if you could call it that -- had been an obsessive need for something, some kind of connection.

Frank had chosen drugs and alcohol, cheap sex, and momentary thrills. His older brother had chosen to try to emulate their father in all the worst ways and eventually it had gotten him killed.

Bobby had told him he never wanted to see him again, had told him he didn't care if Frank died -- hoped for it, in fact, after that one last stunt -- but he never knew if he'd really meant it.

Words made in haste were usually regretted, he knew, but at the same time, Frank had never given him reason to and perhaps Bobby mourned that more than his older brother, himself.

Bobby, instead had first chosen caring for their mother, not seeing any other choice or even once entertaining the idea that Frank would do so. He was their mother's namesake, sure, but he might as well have been a stranger. Bobby had vague, grainy memories of Frank hanging over the side of his crib when he was a baby, dangling a teddy bear at him and making it talk.

But that brother was long gone, as faded as the photograph Nicole Wallace had framed at their mother's grave. That he missed that brother more than almost anything else in the world -- the lone exceptions being Alex -- obviously -- his true faith and the mother who'd read to him and hugged him and hadn't been destroyed by the monsters within her own head -- was a secret he'd only told one other person.

And that person had taken that secret, herself, to the grave.

But he was rambling.

Xander was nothing like either of them and that was perhaps what had cemented it in his mind. He could tell just as easily as with all his fellow abuse survivors that Xander had been so, himself. But he'd managed to surpass it somehow, though Bobby wasn't certain. There were more mysteries about Xander than answers and _that_ was the defining factor.

It was then that Bobby concluded that Mark Ford Brady had left his stain on more mothers than just his own. He didn't like to think that he had a passel of siblings running around in the world, but one was walking around here right under his nose.

He was rambling again.

He'd long ago given up the idea that he might ever think like a normal person. He wasn't normal, simple as that. But, now, as he sat at this table in the Watcher's Council Library being introduced to a younger man -- he'd guess twenty-nine at the oldest -- with an eyepatch and a curiously amusing (at least to him) habit of tilting his head (this time when he was agitated, not contemplative), Bobby's left eye winced shut in sympathy and he would have laughed if the situation weren't so disgustingly ironic and horrifying.

_...No more a rake and no more a bachelor, I was wedded and it whetted my thirst -- until her womb started spilling out babies, only then did I reckon my curse..._

Bobby sat on the information for a month, watching his _brother_ become agitated being cooped up here in this building after so much freedom for so long. He sympathized, but couldn't agree because these walls had, instead, felt so safe to him in light of his world being destroyed in sharp increments like hardened sand in an hourglass.

Finally, he couldn't take it anymore -- or maybe they couldn't because it was actually Xander who'd come to find him.

"Okay, dude, either you're -- well, gay and harboring one hell of a crush on me and I have to say I'm flattered and all kinds of...well, actually, I'm slightly disturbed because everything in me says 'NO, WRONG, STAY AWAY' in huge, flashing letters, but -- "

He apparently didn't expect Bobby to start trying to hold in laughter because then he became offended and folded his arms, scowling, "And since I'm so obviously wrong, please -- by all means, kindly clue me in. It's rude to laugh when people don't know what you're talking about. Or, you know, at all."

Bobby was by then so amused that he didn't stop to think about the effect his words would have on Xander, but the look on his face -- now pale, his remaining eye hard and bright with anger -- gave Bobby instant pause.

Xander glared at him as though he were insane -- something else he was forever used to, "I don't have any sisters _or_ brothers except the family I've fought alongside for thirteen years. What the hell is supposed to make me believe you when you just walk up to me and say you're my middle older brother -- and that we -- you have another older brother, except that he was murdered by your nemesis, who herself was murdered by your mentor, who went crazy along with his daughter, who kidnapped your partner to prove a point to the old bastard? That sounds like a fucking soap opera."

Bobby frowned deeply then, all humor gone in him again, and closed his eyes for a moment before quietly asking Xander to follow him over to the nearest bank of computers and letting himself drop heavily into the soft chair before one. From there, he accessed the NYPD database with ease, and (completely without guilt) from there using some of the many hacking skills Willow had taught him over the previous month.

He pulled up his own profile and then, alongside it, his brother's police record and his father's, as well -- that of his still-missing nephew Donnie (Willow had informed him that she would be glad to help him find him mystically when Bobby was ready and he'd nodded in acceptance) then his mother's medical records (forcing himself to ignore the red 'DECEASED' letters crossing them), and then finally the police record of Mark Ford Brady, this time staring blankly at the similarly obvious 'DECEASED' notation across his file.

Then he turned to Xander, who was staring at everything on the screen in what looked to Bobby like morbid fascination.

"You were an MP in the Army, recommended for Ranger," he heard Xander whisper and wondered why that struck him more than anything else, but forced himself instead to breathe and close his eyes, breathe again, and _not_ slam his hands on the table like he wanted to more than anything else. Forced himself not to scream.

"Who the fuck is Mark Ford Brady?" he heard Xander mutter, the morbid fascination turned up a notch or three.

Bobby gave an empty chuckle, remembering how he'd torn Rodgers' lab apart when he found out that she'd violated his confidence. He'd forgiven her, for the most part, remembering the fear in her eyes and not wanting to be the monster of her daylight hours in those horrible minutes but not knowing how to stop himself or the rage that was consuming him cell by cell, blood vessel by blood vessel.

It all came down to fucking blood. Or not. He never knew who to believe anymore. He'd never been a part of the NYPD Boys' Club, thoroughly alienating the majority of them (Alex -- _Alav Ashalom_. He didn't know where that had come from, he hadn't been raised in his _stepfather's_ religion (the man had never had any faith), but it felt right just then -- and Captains Deakins and Ross being the lone exceptions; he remembers Carver had been pretty patient with him, but he wasn't a cop, it wasn't the same) so much that their children freely mocked him even if they didn't know who he was, personally.

Suddenly Xander's hand was waving in his face, followed by his own. "Hellooooo! Anybody in there!"

Xander wouldn't know how much that particular question hurt, but Bobby couldn't blame him.

Bobby forced himself to meet Xander's eye.

"Please remove your hand from my face," he said as calmly as he could manage.

Xander shrank back, realizing he'd somehow touched a nerve. "Sorry, man, it's just that you were completely somewhere else."

Xander finally pulled a chair out and dropped himself into it, lounging easily despite his latent irritation. "So who's Mark Ford Brady? I mean, besides a serial killer and rapist and all around human vampire?"

Bobby flinched, the bandages on Alex's neck stark in his mind's eye. It was a moment before he said, quite flatly, "My biological father."

Xander was completely silent for almost a minute. Bobby counted the seconds in his head before Xander exploded out of the chair, yelling at the top of his lungs, "NO WAY, _NO_ WAY! I MEAN, MY FOLKS -- MY DAD WASN'T THE BEST -- "

"Alcoholic? Gambling addict? Serial philanderer?" Bobby asked sharply, cutting Xander's words in half. Xander shook his head, his eyes still wide.

"No, no way -- my mom and dad were drunks, sure, but that other fucked up shit? NO."

Bobby sighed, "Did anyone ever tell you what I did at the NYPD before I came here? Why Rupert was so happy to recruit me in the first place?"

Xander scowled, "Nope. Didn't ask. You're here, you're in Watcher training, that's all that matters."

"Bullshit," Bobby snapped but then tried to reign in his temper. "Would you say that to any of the other _newbies_ you've got coming in here?"

"None of them are saying -- "

"Ah, yes, I get it. Whatever. Since apparently they use magick for every fucking thing around here, let's settle this once and for all because I'll tell you, I don't use my gut. That's just a body part. I've got intuition, sure, but my mind is what I do and why Giles and Buffy brought me here. They want me to teach your slayers enough profiling to keep themselves alive as long as Buffy and Faith have been. They won't accept early deaths for Slayers anymore and if they want my help for that, then they can have it. Now -- listen to me!"

Xander, who had been fidgeting and clearly looking for an escape route, froze before relaxing and giving Bobby the ugliest look he could probably manage. Bobby, thoroughly used to the shit he was getting, merely rolled his eyes before continuing.

"We -- _I'll_ talk to Willow and see if she can find a spell that'll tell us if we're related, since I probably won't be able to see a geneticist ever again."

Xander shook his head, "Why the hell did you want to know? Why the hell do you think _I_ would want to know some shit like that, huh? Isn't it bad enough that I had Tony Harris as a dad? Why do I need..."

Xander sank back into the chair, crushing his hands through his hair before forcing himself to breathe again and again.

Finally, in a faint voice, Xander asked, "You called me 'Xander' as soon as you met me. You didn't call me 'Alexander'."

"Willow told me you don't answer to that," Bobby said plainly. "And the only person who ever called me 'Robert' is dead. My name is Bobby, your name is Xander. Simple."

"Why did you just walk up to me and assume we're brothers?" Xander asked in that same faint voice. "Lots of people have black hair and brown eyes and -- "

"Mark Ford Brady's hair was originally black, my mother -- whose eyes were brown -- told me, when she met him. My brother told me the same thing. She cheated on my father with him when Kennedy was elected. That's when I was conceived, she told me. I don't know when he raped her -- I was too young. My brother remembers, though. He says she came home all bruised and cut up. She had her first psychotic break not long after that, apparently. I was three."

Xander sat up straight, his eye wide before he glanced again at the computer screen and saw Frances Goren's medical file.

"Your mother was..."

"Paranoid schizophrenic," Bobby filled in the blanks. It no longer embarrassed him to talk about it. He'd grown out of that so long ago, it was now just a listing of a fact. "I don't know if she would have only been at risk otherwise, but I know that severe trauma of that nature can trigger the first of the patient's losses of touch with reality.

"If I were less...analytical, I guess...I'd say that son of a bitch made me who I am. Those sons of bitches. If I hadn't had to take care of my mother, if my biological father hadn't raped and murdered, if my father hadn't been an abusive, drunken, gambling-addicted son of a bitch and my brother a rather paler imitation..."

Bobby waved an exhausted hand. "Would I be Bobby Goren? Doubt it."

He sighed, "In case you're wondering, _my_ -- at present -- older brother's name was Francis, he was named after my mother. I imagine he was supposed to be their only child. Whatever. I've tried to be a good mistake."

Xander was trying not to frown now, a faint line of tears in his eyes. "What if I said I didn't want any older brothers?"

Bobby shrugged. "Fine. You're entitled to choice."

Xander sneered, "The hell I am. I'm not anymore than you were." And here he leaned forward and glared at Bobby, his voice holding more than two decades' worth of pain. "Do you know what it's like to watch your best friend murdered?"

Bobby narrowed his eyes slightly and reached into his shirt and removed Alex's shield, as well as the cross his mother had worn until her death, and his own tiny shield of St. Michael, patron saint of police officers, which she'd given him the night she died, telling him she loved him for the first time in over forty years.

Telling him she was proud of him and everything he'd been, thanked him for everything he'd been for her. She started to say something else, but then her breath left her and she'd never been able to get it back. He'd closed her eyes and sat back, wanting to wait to press the call button, but in the end unable to.

Unable to be selfish.

Now he held Alex's shield in his hands and traced the numbers engraved in it. "Yes."

"Do you know what it's like to watch the woman you love die?"

Bobby's eyes shut of their own volition. "Yes."

Xander seemed impressed. "They were the same person, weren't they?"

Bobby opened his eyes again. He favored Xander with a flat stare, turning the tables.

"Do you know what it's like to be a punching bag, Xander?"

Xander flinched slightly, but held himself in check. "Yes."

"Do you know what it's like to be a pariah?"

Here, he snorted, "God, yes."

"Do you know what it's like to question your faith, wonder if it's even worth it?"

"Depends on who you're talking about having faith in, but yes."

Bobby found himself chuckling ever so slightly despite himself. "I never lost faith in her."

"Then you're the better of us, then, because -- as I recently found out -- my -- one of my lapses of faith sent my best friend's husband -- for all intents and purposes -- to Hell. One of them anyway. You know there's more than one now, right?"

Bobby nodded and frowned, "Why'd you do it?"

Xander fought another scowl. "Because at the time I didn't know what love was. I'm actually curious if I do now. I hate it but I am. I asked you earlier about the woman you loved, but I should have been more honest -- or at least asked more honest of a question."

Xander met his eyes again now and Bobby had to fight an inner chuckle. He saw that eye every day when he looked in the mirror, still united with its twin on each side of his face. But he'd wait for now.

"When did you know you loved her?"

Bobby blinked, the exact moment coming to him as easily as though it had just happened.

"When I found out she'd retracted a departmental request for a new partner. When she sat on a witness stand in front of me and couldn't even look me in the eye, could barely hold herself together she was trying so hard to speak, not to cry. When she thought she'd betrayed me. She knew I'd had more partners than anyone in the NYPD, living or dead. I'm sure you've heard they didn't like me. Didn't hide that fact.

"I knew for _certain_ when I _had_ to find the person who murdered her husband. I didn't give a damn about it being a case. I cared that it was -- the solve was wrong. Everything that she'd known was a lie and I had to find the truth for her and give it to her. I needed to give her real closure.

"It had been an accident, he'd only been a kid -- the guy. He spent his whole life afterward haunted by an accident. Became a doctor and tried to save lives to make up for the one he'd taken, but he couldn't get Alexandra Eames' husband Joseph Dutton's blood off his hands.

"Nicotine stains took the place of blood, but he could always see it and I could see the horror in his eyes, i-it was everywhere, actually. I...Alex and I both testified at his trial.

"As much as she'd probably wanted him to die, she asked the judge for clemency. For me, I think. Because she knew I didn't want him to die. And because she knew her husband wouldn't have wanted a thirteen-year-old soul -- h-he never grew out of that, you don't grow out of murder -- to be given a hotshot on his account. Kid's serving life in prison -- minimum security, he did get that -- they realized he wasn't anything more than a kid who'd been caught up -- without chance of parole.

"That actually gave her a bit of a black mark -- not that she didn't already have a bunch from working with me, let alone tolerating me, being my friend, my _best friend_. When a cop dies, we -- they're out for blood. _An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth_ isn't just a verse in a book to the police force.

"But I...we were okay with that and that's when I knew for certain that not only was she my whole life, she was part of my soul."

Xander sighed, "Wow. Yeah, I feel really wussy now."

Bobby frowned, "Why?"

"Because I probably would have asked them to let me put the needle in his arm."

Bobby blinked, "Oh. You said your best friend's husband. Do you mean Angel?"

Xander winced and it was a moment before he said, "Yeah. I was young -- which is no excuse -- and I was full of ideas of what my love for her were, but...that was just lust. I'm even...I'm worried about what my feelings for Anya were -- I left her at the altar.

"God, I'm as bad as your father and brother, I cheated on every one of my girlfriends. That or left them at the altar. I'm a real winner, me. Possessive of everything I don't have and careless with what I do."

Bobby fought the stab of dislike that threatened and forced himself to give Xander some benefit of the doubt. "Why are you in doubt?"

Xander took a deep breath and drummed his fingers on the table beside them slightly before making a fist. "Willow was the one who went to L.A. to tell Angel that Buffy was dead -- the second time, after the battle with Glory -- ah, Glorificus -- Hellgod bent on getting back to her home dimension and destroying not only ours but Buffy's younger sister to do it But Willow..."

Xander ran a hand through his hair, unable to keep from glancing up at Bobby's own hair, which he'd brushed regularly for the first time in months. He'd even shaved, but Xander didn't need to know all of that.

"Will -- she recently _enlightened me_ about his reaction. Just talking about it made her cry so much, her magick surged and the windows cracked -- in the room? Like a spiderweb. He completely lost it -- she had to weave spells together to keep him from killing himself and then she and his team had to force-feed him blood, but he kept throwing it back up.

"Rightly thinking I wouldn't have been interested, she didn't tell me at the time. Eventually he got past it, in a way, but right then, if he could have run out into the sun, Willow said he would have. At the time, I was wrapped up in my own pain. I didn't give a damn how Angel felt, just like I hadn't when Buffy killed the man she saw as her husband because of the lie I told."

_...And that's how I became your awful narrator, to be living so easy and free -- I expect that you'd think that I would be haunted, but it never really bothers me..._

"I didn't care then. I do now."

Then they were silent for a long time, each staring at the other, trying to find similarities, but mostly seeing the differences.

"How old are you?" Xander asked him eventually and Bobby sighed, thinking it was at least a fair question.

"Forty-nine."

"So, twenty-one years older than me. If you're right, that -- well, I can't think of any other term I want to use -- cocksucker was out and about for way too fucking long. I assume they _did_ give him the lethal injection."

Bobby nodded, his eyes closing again. "The same night my mother died. I wasn't there. I was with her. Fuck him."

"Shit," was Xander's reply but Bobby couldn't see his face and didn't care to.

Then Xander was quiet for a very long time. "Was Alex as good as your wife?"

Bobby's eyes flew open and he fought the way his mouth twitched again. "Why?"

Xander sighed, "Because you couldn't pry Buffy and Angel apart with a crowbar now. God, my best friend and her _mate_ are gods or god-like creatures all of a sudden? Maybe something like actual angels or something -- Giles says they're called acolytes.

"But even before that, wherever they were in this world or any other, they could feel one another. Then there's the fact that Buffy has Angel's Mark and her blood in his veins, no matter how much animal blood he consumes. The same with Faith. It's freaky how much that guy gets around but don't tell anyone I said that because I like my head attached to my neck.

"Anyway, Angel's a Seer. Buffy was kind enough to tell me that. Angel affirmed it, though he hadn't known what it was at the time -- I mean, when he was human. But the point is that they have an especially deep bond with one another. He was in the Pylean dimension and sleeping when he just -- just woke up, out of nowhere -- gasping. It seems to happen that way most of the time. Hearsay, because I learned the hard way that asking vampires and Slayers about their mates is extremely rude -- but this happens a lot with Angel: something important happens and he might even know about it already. He dreams about it. I'm sure he's been a Seer his entire unnaturally long life and it's caused him a hell of a lot of grief."

Bobby was impressed with the way Xander was so very close to completely changing the subject, but he wouldn't let that happen.

"Not much of this -- as interesting as it all is -- has anything to do with what I was telling you or the impact it's having on you, _or_ me -- though you've had a lot of practice at this, I'll give you the credit you're due. But you asked me a question and I asked why, but I'll answer it because perhaps the digression was my fault. The answer is...emotionally, yes.

"In every way, if I had been free to marry her, I would have. I didn't marry her for the same reason I didn't accept Rupert's original offer. She wouldn't have been my partner anymore and as backwards as I'm sure that sounds, it means I would have spent ninety percent of my time with another person. Or one hundred, in the case of accepting this offer before..."

"She died," Xander said softly and Bobby brought his fist to his mouth, this time not bothering to force the tears back again. He shook his head and sniffed hard before pulling out his handkerchief and pressing it hard into his eyes.

"I-I thought her maternity leave...was bad...God, that was just a warm-up. I felt like I was adrift at sea then. I'm at the bottom of-of the ocean now."

Bobby heard Xander sigh before there was a scrape of the chair backing up and he forced his eyes open to see Xander standing in front of him, somehow managing not to be at all threatening despite standing over him.

Alex used to say the same thing about him when it came to kids.

"What's this going to mean, us possibly being brothers? I need you to tell me. I'm already grown, I don't need anyone telling me what to do unless it's to do with Slayers or Watchers."

Bobby nodded, "It just means that each of us has a family member we can see and hear again."

Xander bit his lip, then -- in a rush -- admitted, "I don't feel bad for my mother. I...I'm not saying she had it coming, nobody deserves that, but...if she let Tony do what he did to me because she thought it'd hurt _him_? Then...then I can't care. Not now, not...not ever."

He was surprised when Bobby only nodded, but just decided to go with it. "I had the right to grow up loved, cared for, looked at as something other than some unfortunate two-person epidemic. The -- Willow and Jesse were my family, then Willow, Buffy, and Giles. Then...well, I've got a pretty -- _we've_ got a pretty big family now if this is true so that's not a problem anymore. We've got acceptance."

Bobby nodded again, wincing slightly. "I'm...fairly certain your friend Willow might have a slight crush on me."

At this Xander snorted, "Hey, don't make me go picking sides. Besides, she tells me Kennedy was just a regular relationship, but Oz -- her ex, Daniel Osbourne, you've probably already met him."

As a matter of fact Bobby had, when the werewolf had dropped by for a short visit. He liked the quiet guy very much. Bobby nodded again.

"Yeah, she says Oz and Tara -- her ex-girlfriend, though they'd gotten back together. She was killed, but...I don't know, apparently, Willow can visit her on the ethereal plane, which...but anyway. They're Willow's mates. I mean, Oz is the werewolf, but Willow's his mate just like with Buffy and Angel. They share each other in a way, she tells me. I think Faith and Spike might be feral for each other, too, but I don't have any proof so I'll just keep that between you and me until they start with the gratuitous making out.

"Gee, I said 'gratuitous'. Giles'll be so proud. It's kind of weird. I don't really try to get into it because that not-human, 'you're my mate' stuff kind of goes over..."

Xander managed to peter off his babbling when something occurred to him. "You're not a werewolf, are you?"

Bobby sighed, "No, Xander, I'm not. And I'm not a vampire, either. I'm not a demon -- balancing or no -- of any species. I'm just as human as you."

Bobby tilted his head, raising his eyebrow. "You sound nervous when saying that."

And here Xander shot a glare at him. "We're not that close yet. We haven't even performed a paternity spell. Or, I guess, fraternity."

Bobby did not roll his eyes. "I understand. If it makes you feel any better, when I found out, I didn't take it well at all. I destroyed a medical examiner's lab because she violated my confidence to my superior. My feelings were out of control and so was I. I know that, but...I never apologized. She did to me, after Alex d -- died.

"She attended Alex's funeral and forced me to listen to her. She said she was sorry that she told my captain about...him. She said she wished she could take it back. She said I came to her with the expectation that whatever happened, it would stay between she and I unless I decided to tell someone I trusted. I _did_, I told Alex. But she said she let Ross railroad her -- "

"He sounds like a dick."

"He is. He doesn't particularly care. He's used to being seen as one so he uses it to his advantage."

Xander favored Bobby with a hint of a smile, "Sounds like you do the same, if not as a dick."

Bobby didn't return the smile, "I've never had much of a choice. But I accepted her apology and apparently that's all she was after. She understood why I wouldn't do the same in return. My captain courted the idea of me murdering not long afterward, so she wasn't looking for forgiveness."

Xander's mouth fell open, his eyes widening. "Okay, that -- that is not cool."

Bobby snorted, this time. "I assure you, Xander, no one in the NYPD -- or any police force -- cares very much about what's _cool_, much less with me. You said you knew what it was like to be a pariah so you know damned well why they wouldn't care. They just want to get their perp. The road there is immaterial."

"Are you sure we're brothers? 'Cause you're, like, really smart -- obviously -- and I'm not."

Bobby sighed. "I refuse to have a conversation with you about that. I'll just remind you that Willow said you, she, and Buffy were all in the same classes and leave it at that.

"Anyway, since we've been here for a very long time and it's now dark, care to show me what it's like to actually slay a vampire? Watcher training seems to keep dancing around that part and it's annoying as hell."

Xander bit back a laugh. "Fine, but since I missed lunch with this little chat, you're buying dinner."

"Deal," Bobby said simply, each of them rising. "I'll drop the bomb on Willow if you need me to since we need her to do the spell."

"Deal, but she's going to hug me first even if she does have any sort of crush on you."

"Yeah, yeah."

"You don't find it at all odd that I'm from California and you're from New York -- which part, by the way?"

"No. Serial killers don't usually stay in one place. Brooklyn. You're from Sunnydale, now let's go."

"Damn, you're bossy."

And they left the library.

They didn't touch, they didn't hug or any other maudlin expressions of unearned affection. But they weren't fighting and between the two of them it was more than enough for now.

FIN


	3. Expansion

**Expansion**  
_By Angelfirenze_

**Disclaimer:** Carter, Whedon, and Wolf own all. Except for the miscellaneous characters mentioned from various Buffyverse AU novelizations. Golden and Holder likely own them. Death Cab for Cutie. "Talking Bird.". Atlantic, Barsuk, Fierce Panda, Sub Pop, Warner, 2008.

**Summary:** Xander stared at Bobby, his head tilting again in his upset, "You and your friends make me and my friends look normal."

**Timeline:** post-'Opportunities' and 'Triple-Sided Coin', because - apparently - this story's not finished with me, either. Post-The Book of Fours by Nancy Holder, the AU novel that takes place during the third season of Buffy. Post-The X-Files complete canon. Note (a): While this takes place in the Season Eight time frame, nothing in it has happened. This continues to be AU.

**Notes:** This was hard. Gee. You'd think I'd never written angst before. *laughs helplessly*

Expansion

Bobby sighed and stared at Xander from across the table in their booth at the pub they'd found. Xander had managed to convince them to make him a set of fried egg and cheese sandwiches while Bobby had stuck with corned beef and hash, something he knew they understood.

They'd eaten silently, Bobby feeling as though the specter of the monster he'd met on Riker's Island sitting right beside them the entire time.

Finally Xander polished off his second sandwich and sat back, a sigh falling out before he could help it.

"You were recommended for Ranger," he said to Bobby, whose brow furrowed.

"You're rather fixated upon that. Why?"

Xander shrugged, "Personal curiosity. Once we get out of here, I'll explain more. For now, though, kindly make with the elaborating."

Bobby blinked, still a bit unused to the way everyone talked at the ICW, with the exception of Giles. A fair few of them were from California like Xander, he knew, so that had something to do with it, but only three Slayers had been from New York and, to his chagrin, they'd recognized him from the Times and the Post. He'd done his best not to blush, but hadn't quite managed it.

"Well, like you know I was a military police officer in the Army and - well, I made some big solves, really I worked with others, but they awarded me for being the one to crack the cases. I..." Bobby ran his hand over the back of his neck, rather uncomfortable talking about himself this way, but he figured he owed his brother the objective truth, even if Xander didn't believe they were real brothers yet.

"Just...I notice things. They come back to me later and I can usually figure out what happened from there. It just...it falls in a line in my head and..." he shrugged. "I don't know how to explain it. Solving cases isn't easy, but following the clues - for me, it's like calculus."

Xander's eyes widened and he backed up slightly, "Oh, God - calculus. I hated calculus."

Bobby frowned, "You couldn't do it?"

Xander sighed and rolled his eyes, "I _could_ actually. There were just things I would have much rather have been doing. Like making out, for instance."

Bobby snorted and laughed into his food. "The perils of having girls as friends."

Xander's eyes widened, "AHA! So...Alex? Did you ever?"

Bobby's eyes darkened slightly, but he forced himself to answer, "There...were times when - when I wanted to kiss her so badly, I wanted...I wanted it in every part of me. Like nothing else. But I couldn't. _We_ couldn't. The Job. It kept us both together and apart and I'm both resentful and unbelievably thankful for that."

"So - assuming this is all true, I don't have any nieces or nephews to meet anywhere."

Bobby sighed, "No. And I doubt that outside of your 'Scooby Gang' you ever will. Alex...not even The Job compared to her and that was one of the most consuming things in my life. Outside of caring for my mother, I mean. Keeping her safe from herself."

Xander smiled wanly, "There wasn't any keeping my mother safe from herself. Or Tony. There was keeping myself safe from him and Sunnydale safe from...everything else. Oh - and being the second Harris to graduate high school. Or is it third?"

"Second? Third?" Bobby asked, his head tilted to the side before he realized it and Xander glanced up from his last sandwich (damn, this kid could put away some food - scratch that. He wasn't a kid anymore) and his own expression darkened.

"My dad - though, maybe not - has a brother who lives in San Diego. I have a cousin, or I guess not, but he was diagnosed with leukemia after his arm broke in half during some sport thing or whatever that I'm too uncoordinated - or was at the time - to also participate in back in the 'Dale, and I was a match for his blood marrow.

"They fronted our expenses and everything, my asshole, better-than-your-white-trash-asses 'uncle', 'aunt', and 'cousin' - who all call me 'Alexander' and the last of whom I would happily punch in the face but continues to live on because I gave him my marrow. Really interesting now that I think about it. Whatever. I spent two months of that summer in the veritable lap of luxury when compared to what I'd experienced at the time and, far more importantly, away from Tony.

Xander brightened sarcastically, then, "Plus, my mother stayed sober for ninety percent of the first three days so - bonus. DTs set in near midnight and we had to sneak out to get her some beers. I don't know or care if they knew about it, but she lived to drink another day."

Bobby sighed and fought the urge to frown. Or was it laugh. "DTs killed...my stepfather. Ironically, while he was already battling liver cancer. I cleaned out his apartment - Frank was...I don't know where Frank was, didn't often know, no matter how much my mother was convinced of otherwise. But I found..."

Bobby sniffed hard, this time, unexpectedly wanting to cry again, though at least he could rationalize it. The man _had_ been a father to him, if not for as long as he should have. "He - Anthony Goren - which is interesting in a morbid sort of way - both our stepfathers having the same forename. No one ever called him 'Tony' to my knowledge, though.

"But he had - stacks and stacks of the Times and the Post and he'd gone through with highlighters and marked off and circled my name, sometimes until it had bled through several pages beneath - those were front page articles. He circled my pictures with Alex. Stacks and stacks - a fire hazard, really. He used to come to my basketball games when I played in junior high - most of them. He quit coming right as I was leaving eighth grade and...well, I stopped wanting to play. I guess he started sinking, then."

Xander found himself smiling bitterly, "That's really - well, that newspaper part's really, _really_ cool and how he came to your games, I mean, at least at first. I...well, I doubt that even if I _had_ been a jock that Tony would have come to my games. Less time for getting wasted. He and my mom left town before everything went down. I forced them to go and my mom swore she was going to ditch him at some point, but I don't know if she did."

"He beat her," Bobby concluded, gripping his glass slightly before taking a swig of his water.

"Yeah. After the whole thing at the Zoo and the Hyena getting some control, he stopped hitting me - and her, until I graduated, but my mom likely remains a punching bag, as we've both so eloquently phrased it. If I ever find them again, I...I don't know. A huge part of me wants to knock his head off his shoulders whenever I see him and, chances are, I could probably do it.

"Thing is...I don't know if I could stop there and that's what's kept me from even trying. I don't want to be a killer. I...I've seen the toll that kind of stuff takes on Angel and Spike and Buffy and Willow - even Oz, there was this one wolf that threatened Willow once and..."

Xander finished in a whisper, his hands gripping the edge of the table they sat at before he reached up and traced the watermark his glass of juice had left.

He noticed that both of them had refused even a little alcohol. He noticed they both had mothers at the mercy of their own demons. He wondered if they might look more alike when he got to be Bobby's age. He wondered if he'd even _reach_ Bobby's age.

"You ever shoot anybody when making an arrest?"

Bobby bit his lip, but shook his head. "No. Alex...three times - during our partnership. I hated seeing her face every time. I just wanted to hold her and tell her everything would be okay, but that's a lie. Everyone tells so many lies about death. Especially friends. The first person to tell me the truth about losing Alex was Buffy. I'll never be able to repay her for that."

Xander nodded, understanding just how Buffy had known what to say or why. "I want to tell you be glad you don't have any powers or...strength or whatever, but - hey, you're with us, now. Who knows what'll happen."

Bobby gave him a piercing look and Xander finally gave in, nodding and rising, pulling a roll of bills out of his pant pocket and leaving two twenty pound notes on the table.

Bobby chuckled without meaning to, releasing the folded notes he had been about to pull out of his own coat pocket. "The payroll this place hands out is insane," he muttered and Xander nodded as they left, Bobby waving a hand and pausing to light a cigarette before continuing again.

Xander paused and blinked, "You smoke?"

Bobby sighed, exhaling a few rings. "Here and there, off and on - recently, more 'on', but...I don't want it to...when I was on suspension, I smoked a lot more. After...Alex's funeral, I smoked a cigar with Logan - ah, Michael Logan is a friend of mine, him and Carolyn Barek - they were partners, too, in our squad and we were kind of...well, out of everyone there, Barek and I were the most unpopular and - Alex and Mike and Carolyn and I were kind of close as a result; ah, Megan Wheeler actually called me from somewhere around here, she's teaching Criminology classes in France, I-I think, but she was Mike's last partner before he retired and she knows about me, everyone knows about me in the NYPD - everyone knows everyone else - but Mike and I, we both smoked a cigar on my front stoop, but...I'm not trying to let it become a habit again. It was while I was in Narcotics. I didn't want to tempt fate like some of my colleagues, taking a little off the top. You get in the same trouble the perps we're trying to catch do that way."

Xander raised an eyebrow, "You're earning a Silver Star in AP Babbling right now. Really, Willow and I should get together to grade you on your speed and fluster. But more importantly - you do realize your lungs are rotting, don't you? Wills could probably show you the most awful pictures. She's had various morgues bookmarked since we were in ninth grade."

Bobby coughed out a laugh, shaking his head and pulling one more before tossing the butt down and stomping on it.

"I know what it's doing. I've seen the bodies up close - they, uh, they used to mock me for that, too. M.E. Rodgers, before she and I - I kind of think I sort of grew on her because she knew what I was going to do at a crime scene, ah, inspect the body or bodies and look for things and how when I was in the morgue, I wasn't going to keep my hands to myself. She let me run amok for a bit but then she'd reach a point where she would grab my hands and then get an instrument instead. Basically, 'step back now, brat'."

Xander cackled, glee filling his eyes as he imagined it, and he and Bobby began walking again. Finally, when they were far enough from any accidental witnesses, Bobby surprised him by firing off, _"Attention, soldier!"_

Almost without thinking, Xander halted and stood at attention, his left hand unconsciously holding up the butt of an imaginary rifle.

Bobby's eyebrow rose and he smiled just a bit. Xander gave him the finger before shifting to 'at ease' and then relaxing completely.

"How fast can you put together an AK-47?" Xander asked, eager to get revenge.

"Don't know, but I can assemble and dissemble an M-16 in 42 seconds."

"Fuck. 27 on the AK assemble, 30 on the dissemble. I've never used an M-16."

"What the hell were you doing even _holding_ an assault rifle? You were - how the hell old were you? Was it your father's? Tony's?"

Bobby was shocked, appalled, and every other word for pissed now and was hard pressed not to fold his arms and glare, knowing it would do no good.

Xander snorted, seeing all of this and finding it rather amusing. "To answer your questions, the first will have to be last. I was sixteen. No, it wasn't Tony's. Remember what we told you about Sunnydale? Well, one Halloween, Spike - remember, this is when he was evil - and some other demons were there when one of Giles' buddies from his 'rebellion phase', Ethan Rayne, put a spell over the whole town to turn us all into our Halloween costumes."

Bobby sighed, "And you were a soldier."

"Yep. Just add water and voila! Army Ranger, complete with tats on my biceps. I kind of miss those. They're just as kickass as an eyepatch. If I could have them _both_...but the spell ended before midnight. Giles probably tortured Rayne to get him to reverse the spell, but I was a Ranger, Buffy was an eighteenth century noblewoman at the _worst_ possible time - hence a then-evil Spike totally taking advantage, and Willow was some kind of sexy ghost - I'm not really sure what her original costume was supposed to be, but there was midriff. Cordelia was the only one who retained her sanity because she got her costume somewhere else."

Bobby gave in to his urge to frown, though now for different reasons, "Cordelia. Willow said she worked with Angel in L.A. and died a few years ago, but that you dated her for a while in high school, which went against the 'We Hate Cordelia' Club charter so she didn't speak to you for a while."

Xander nodded, wondering if there was _anything_ Bobby forgot, but knowing what was coming...sure enough: "And you cheated on her."

Xander winced with his right eye and corrected Bobby even though it didn't matter, "Kissed Willow even though she was with Oz because I thought we were going to die and did I mention I'm a really big jerk?"

"You might've," Bobby retorted, which could have been a joke if not for the very not-joking expression on his face. Xander sighed, "If it helps to apologize to you, as well, I'm sorry. I...there are so many things I've apologized for. A few more won't hurt. I'm sorry."

Xander froze, then he scowled, "What the hell am I doing? I don't owe you anything. I barely know you."

Bobby held back the urge to scowl, himself, but managed to nod. "I think it's time to talk to Willow now. The longer we put this off, the less likely it is you'll be willing to go through with it."

"Are _you_?" Xander asked, just this side of incredulous. "I mean, sure - I'm grown, but obviously I still need _some_ maintenance and family or not, like I said, you don't owe me anything - "

"I really should have asked Alex if I was this self-abusing of a younger brother when I had the chance," Bobby cut in, reaching out and taking gentle hold of Xander's shoulder before turning him and giving him a slight shove back in the direction of the ICW. "If I'm the one that started this whole adventure, what makes you think I'd back out on it - when I've been waiting a month to even talk to you about it because I know perfectly well what every single part of this means? More than you, even, because I met _our father_ the week before he was put to death?"

Xander pulled himself out of Bobby's lax grip and stared wide-eyed at the now-pale and rather lost-looking older man behind him. He turned and faced Bobby fully. "You...met Mark Ford Brady?"

Bobby nodded, running his hand over his once-again well-groomed hair. He looked down at himself and was mostly surprised, though still not entirely sure why. It had been a very long time since he'd dressed in his once-usual manner, but he almost felt like Alex was walking aside him or sitting across from him when he wore his suits and ties and if he just didn't look up...

He'd finally decided to clean himself back up in her honor. Better to think about that than the fact that Bobby didn't believe he, himself, was worth it.

Running his fingers over his tie-clip, Bobby fought the urge to cry once more and simply nodded again. Forcing his voice into blankness, he said, "There isn't anything about that visit I care to remember, recall, impart, or see the value in doing so. Everything about him that's of import we already - well, I already know. And there's very, _very_ little of it left beyond you and I standing here right now."

Xander felt the bottom drop out of his stomach before it threatened to shove upward through his throat and he had to breathe, his eyes clenched shut, trying to force the shadow of some dimorphic shape out of his head. "Oh...oh, God..."

But then Bobby was rubbing his back and gathering him gently into something like a hug. Xander flinched and stiffened at first, but Bobby continued to simply rub his back and he relaxed again some unknown time later. Dimly, he realized Bobby had been whispering...he wasn't sure what, in his ear.

Before he could stop himself, Xander could feel himself starting to cry, his entire body shaking and the only thing holding him up being Bobby and his very strong hands and his voice in Xander's ear saying things he couldn't understand, more loudly now so he could be heard over Xander's quiet sobs.

He had no way of knowing Alexandra Eames, herself, had done this for Robert Goren more than a year before. And Bobby wouldn't ever realize she'd taken her cues from him.

"I used - " Xander moaned, backing away and rubbing the back of his hand and then his arm over his eye, trying to dry his face unsuccessfully. "To hope...I didn't want...God, _Tony_!" Xander snarled, more tears surging forward and he fell to his knees and forward so that his forehead was pressed into the damp grass below him.

Vaguely, out of the side of his left eye, he could see Bobby squatting beside him before kneeling (he faintly thought Bobby's suit was far too nice for this but discarded the idea in favor of _OH MY GOD, MY BIOLOGICAL FATHER'S A SERIAL FUCKING KILLER AND RAPIST! TONY'S A FUCKING IMPROVEMENT!_) and concentrated on not vomiting.

He believed Bobby. He couldn't say why or how, or even wonder if this was just some nightmare he'd wake up from or a really, really distasteful joke - or a disgusting practical one gone completely to shit.

The only thing going to shit right now was him. Good thing that wasn't new or he might not be able to handle it.

_..Sometimes you get confused like there's a hint that I'm trying to give you...The longer you think, the less you know what to do..._

Willow's eyes were filling with tears and Xander and Bobby both hated it and wanted, needed to be _anywhere_ - the fucking North _Pole_ - but here.

But - because there was always a big, hairy, filthy but involved - Willow was the only one aside from Giles (and neither were ready to reduce Giles to such levels of complete and utter speechlessness just yet, if ever) who could do this and it needed to be done and if anyone could do it, it was Willow, their resident Glinda (well, most of the time).

Xander kept a supply of yellow crayons to remind himself that even she wasn't perfect and he wondered what she would keep now for him, if she did anything, that was.

Willow, sure enough, hugged Xander first, grabbing him so hard, the breath was forced out of him and he wondered when in the hell his tiny redheaded friend had gotten so _strong_, but then he could breathe again and Willow's arms were around Bobby and she was crying quietly for them both.

All she could manage to finally do was nod and then begin typing.

Xander looked away, hating the way her tears splashed on her hands and her keyboard, but he knew his brother - they'd taken the last week to observe one another at every (ample) opportunity, with Xander deciding to bunk with Bobby while he was still in England - was staring just about uncontrollably.

For instance, Xander didn't really like to read the newspaper, but Bobby took every subscription he could now very well afford and read them _all_ every day. Xander loved Lucky Charms and would save the rainbows and four leaf clovers for last, eating them only after he'd drunk the milk.

Bobby thought it was disgusting and didn't hide his grimace fast enough the first time. Xander followed him around at breakfast after that, slurping his soggy marshmallows as loudly as possible, making completely unnecessary noises of ecstasy when finished.

Bobby never hit him and certainly never threw his coffee - or anything, actually - at him. Xander marveled at the man's patience sometimes.

Xander, after cheating thoroughly at Duck Hunt on the original Nintendo Entertainment System he'd brought over from home, even though he could shoot at Olympic/assassin levels, would go to sleep on the couch. But when Bobby woke up in the morning, he'd usually find Xander huddled in a corner on the floor. He'd carefully wake the younger man and help him to his feet and the cycle would start anew.

Neither commented on any of this.

Xander still had the skateboard he was riding the day he met his other best friend in this world or any other.

Bobby could speak Hebrew - which he'd been whispering to Xander that night on the grass - and was now trying to teach it to Xander, with Willow's ecstatic (if confused) help.

Obseration.

Bobby's apartment is filled with more books than Xander has probably read in his life and he has a special box for mail he sends to and from Michael Logan and Carolyn Barek, a James Deakins and a Ronald Carver.

Xander wheedled Bobby into showing him a copy of his police academy graduation photo and Xander forked over his scorched high school diploma, as well as his only yearbook in return.

Bobby recited the alphabet in every language he knew and some he was only passable in. Xander went grocery shopping and brought home the closest things he could find to Twinkies, Ding Dongs, and HoHos.

Bobby has secretly arranged for Mike to go to the closest corner store in his neighborhood and buy up their supplies, fronting him the money (and a 'little extra') from Bobby's own now vastly decadent (in his eyes) Swiss (Swiss, for God's sake!) bank account. He has also invested in an electric toothbrush, and enough Crest Pro-Health and Listerine to last the rest of the month, if not longer.

Bobby refuses to teach Xander how to swear in more than Spanish or elaborate on the rather small vocabulary he _does_ regrettably have.

Responsibility.

Bonding.

Willow came to them not only with tears, but she was chewing her bottom lip in that perplexed way that Xander had long ago learned meant something was up that no one expected. Oh, _joy_.

"Come on, Will-a-rama. Give it to us straight," he said as calmly as he could, trying to force himself to breathe normally. Next to him - Bobby always, always stood on his sighted side - his brother looked a lot calmer through decades of practice and a hell of a lot of need of experience, but Xander could see his left hand, his dominant, he now knew, ever so slightly clenching the binder he carried absolutely everywhere.

Willow's bottom lip quivered and Xander knew they were done for. He turned to Bobby and asked, "What's a swear word in Hebrew that'd be really good right now?"

Bobby gave him such a dark look that Xander was sorry he'd opened his mouth, but instead of expecting an apology, Bobby grabbed him out of nowhere in a hug so tight it made Willow's look light in comparison.

"You understand this is not by any means for public consumption," he asked her, rather forcefully, considering how he'd been burned in the past and Willow all but squeaked before nodding rapidly.

Then Bobby realized whom he was talking to and relaxed. "Sorry, I..." He gave up and went back to hugging his _little brother_, this time pressing his face into Xander's hair and thoroughly ignoring Xander's swears and squirming.

Xander was convinced he'd have bruises on his arms and sides, but - for the first time - not the bad kind.

"Um, guys?" Willow sniffled, meekly regaining their attention, clearly unsure of whether to be happy, horrified, or some mixture of both as Xander, himself, had settled upon. "Do either of you know a federal agent - er, a _former_ federal agent named Dr. Dana Scully?"

Bobby now froze, his eyes widening as he backed carefully away from Xander and stared at Willow, "What?"

Willow showed him her results, no doubt aided with magick, and not only were Bobby and Xander's own names there, but one Dana Scully - or, hell, Dana Mulder, for all that counted - all with the same blood type, O Negative and, surprisingly, genome sequencing with only minor differences. Willow hadn't done this lightly.

"Who's Dana Scully?"

But for only the third time in his life, Robert Goren was struck absolutely speechless. He blinked and stared down at the printout Willow had handed him, remembering Scully's shiny red hair (he always remembered that first for some reason) and the anguish on her face when they'd stopped in the City to meet up with himself, Munch, and Fin on the way upstate to hide Mulder.

It had been Bobby who'd helped them place William in a good foster home. Bobby and Mulder had both secretly harbored serious doubts about the so-called _cure_ Mulder's brother, Jeffrey Spender, had given to force William's alien DNA to become dormant.

But...

Finally Bobby remembered he wasn't alone and looked back up, "I just...I know her. I know - look, it's kind of tedious to explain, so Willow, please, just hack into the FBI database and research The X-Files. You'll get all the names and other things I'd need to tell you. I...God..._Dana?_"

Willow, already typing away, nodded, but Xander snatched the printout from Bobby and stared at it, turning it in several directions as if it would suddenly make sense to him.

"Bobby. Who the hell's Dana Scully?" he asked finally, snapping _his brother's_ attention back to him.

"A heroine - though not the same as Buffy, Faith, or the other Slayers - with a lot already on her plate and we've just added seconds and thirds. Her husband - though not by law - would, unfortunately understand everything we're going through. Funny, we were suitemates at Oxford. Fox Mulder. Don't call him Fox."

"Um, Bobby?" Willow's tear-stained voice echoed up from the bank of computers somewhat behind them. "It says that Agent Fox Mulder died of inoperable brain cancer in 2000."

But Bobby just waved a hand. "Scully had inoperable brain cancer, too, as you can see there, but she went into remission. Mulder had something done, plus he was partially lobotomized against his will at some point and anyway Buffy died in 2001, but she's up and about," he had to force himself not to snap.

"John Munch paid a lot of money on our - Mulder's one of my and his best friends - account to have that turn up whenever someone tried to research him. If it were more thorough, it'd say he was put to death for high treason the year before that. Dig deeper."

Xander stared at Bobby, his head tilting again in his upset, "You and your friends make me and my friends look normal."

Bobby forced out "Fuck off" in such an angry whisper that Xander actually shut up.

Oddly enough, just now, this entire scenario made Bobby remember Mulder telling him about his father dying while he'd been in the bathroom looking for something. Mulder's family tombstone flashed in his head and his heart clenched.

Then the echo of Dana's brother Bill calling them all 'freaks' when he'd assumed they couldn't hear, Dana punching him as hard as she could in the arm...

Bill wasn't his brother, he didn't owe that shithead anything. But he - he and Xander - owed it to Dana to...what? William Scully, Sr., had been the only good father out of the bunch. He didn't want to take that away from her.

Bill Scully had always blamed Mulder and everyone else they knew for Dana's problems. On some level, Bobby felt the ass was absolutely correct - he'd done the same to Alex, after all - but it had been Dana's choice, just as Alex had made clear to him that hers had been the same.

He - he and Xander. They owed her the truth.

She'd been lied to enough. She, of all people, would appreciate it if they didn't do the same out of some misguided need to protect her.

Especially when she could both shoot them in very painful places as well as dissect them, all thanks to the same education.

That she had two shoulders to lean on might mean everything, it might mean nothing. It had been more than Mulder had gotten, finding out that - well, hell, was CGB Spender on Mark Ford Brady's scale? He'd have to _seriously_ think that one through.

As it was, Dana had told him in their last emails that Mulder was cooped up all the time and it was getting to him. He was regressing to those days in the FBI when he'd been considered a scourge. Bobby had reminded her that he currently _was_ considered a scourge and while the hiding might have been new, the isolation wasn't. He'd never been accepted.

Dana had remembered, then, that Bobby had known exactly what he was talking about it. The psychological effect all this was having on Mulder was absolutely untenable. Bobby had quite easily imagined her crying just then.

She'd likely tell him to fuck off with what he had to say now. He couldn't say he didn't understand or even minded, if it meant he'd get to see her again. See Mulder.

The ICW would shelter them, they could finally get solid updates on William's progress.

And as an admission price, Dana's world had to fall apart and be put back together again. _Shit._

"Wow." Willow said, backing away from her computer, her eyes wide in astonishment. Bobby turned to look at where Willow, with Xander hanging over her shoulder, was staring at him in awe.

"I feel lazy, does anybody else feel lazy?" Xander asked, scowling and Bobby smiled.

"No more than usual," he answered, sitting down and finally pulling out his laptop that Willow had only recently finished doctoring to make completely untraceable and God only knew what else before shuffling his bag back underneath the newly occupied workstation. "And none of you are lazy, nor have you ever been. You've had your own hands in keeping the world spinning. That alone renders 'laziness' impossible."

He offered them both one last saddened smile and opened his email account before he paused, trying to find words. How the hell can someone tell a friend she's actually their a bit younger sister thanks to a murdering rapist when that same physician/former FBI agent had seen all the things she had and lived to tell about it?

Suddenly Xander sort of seemed like a cakewalk, though he wasn't certain why. Maybe it had been the assurance that he could take Xander in a fight, even if it'd be a close one. Dana would be handing him his ass and smile while doing so.

With that in mind, Bobby grimaced and started typing.

END


	4. Lapsed

**Lapsed**  
_By Angelfirenze_

**Disclaimer:** Carter, Whedon, and Wolf own all. Except for the miscellaneous characters mentioned from various Buffyverse AU novelizations. Golden and Holder likely own anything I reference.

The Decemberists. "The Engine Driver.". Hush, Rough Trade, 2005. Lifehouse. "Someone Else's Song.". Dreamworks, Geffen, 2005.

Transcription of 'Five By Five' from AtS, 1.18, from

**Summary:** Dana let out a breathy sob, the tears finally spilling. The least she owed Bobby was the benefit of the doubt that he was possibly right and wasn't losing touch with reality. She, at least, could accept asking to see...Xander on a webcam and meeting him face to face.

**Timeline:** Part Four in the 'Fraternity' series, because - apparently - this story's not finished with me, either. Post-The Book of Fours by Nancy Holder, the AU novel that takes place during the third season of Buffy. Post-The X-Files complete canon. Note (a): While this takes place in the Season Eight time frame and, actually, the real-life one - nothing in Season Eight has happened. This continues to be AU.

**Notes:** I've been watching CI from the first episode onward. So many _clues_ they probably built upon. Damn them.

Lapsed

Bobby felt his gut clench as he read the single line of Scully's return email:

_ARE YOU FUCKING CRAZY?_

He tried to breathe, tried to remember what he'd been forced to tell her and that if she wasn't in shock and disbelief she would never flippantly question his sanity because she _knew_ him, knew how he'd grown up, knew his greatest fear, and wouldn't take any of this lightly.

But, again, she, he, and Xander were all in the same boat. There wasn't a choice for any of this and for the thousandth time, Bobby cursed Mark Ford Brady and damned him to Hell as best as he could. Preferably one of the ones with a lot of torture and rendering of body parts.

But, for now, Bobby simply tried to hold in his anguish and his tears and simply forced himself to type out a reply, failing somewhat as he had to stop several times to gather himself and try to get the words out before his nerve failed him completely.

_Scully,_

_Dana. No. Please, do you really think I'd say anything like that, even bring it up if I thought for a moment it was a hoax or _

Bobby bit his lip, trying to breathe around the horror that had suffused him since he'd gotten the results from Willow. Xander, himself, had his own plate full because he'd chosen tonight to tell his family - _their family_, Xander insisted - about their biological father and take their reactions as they were.

Bobby had offered to go with him, but Xander had insisted this was something he'd needed to do on his own because Bobby would become a distraction and, besides, Bobby still had Dana's reply to respond to and Xander couldn't bring himself to do so, what with having never met Dana or worked in their fields, even if they'd ended up in similar situations way too often for anyone's liking.

Xander hadn't admitted that he felt Bobby had gotten the easier job, what with having the choice of email, but Bobby could tell what his little brother was thinking anyway. Xander wasn't at all good at hiding his feelings like Angel and his son, Connor, were - for instance.

Buffy was another very good example, but Bobby was allowing himself to get off the point and that wasn't a good thing. The longer he took to get this out, the worse it was going to be in the long run.

_or a_ prank _of some kind, that I would even bring it to your attention, much less torture you with something like this._

_You know me better than that, Dana. You're my friend, I'm Mulder's friend. We don't do this to one another - not even Doggett or Reyes, Follmer - not even Krycek would do something like this. Before you asked, I checked with Willow Rosenberg, the woman who did the extremely in-depth testing and hacking, Krycek is not, nor has that rat bastard ever been related to either of us._

_Dana, please. Please - I'm not asking you to trust me about this, that'd be an impossible request to make of you, but I can promise that I would never hurt you this way if I...God, Dana, I just couldn't do this to you._

Bobby had to back away from the glowing screen before him and lay his head down in his arms, sobbing almost as hard as he had when Alex died.

Wiping his face on his sleeve when the torrent had abated, Bobby returned to his email and forced himself to finish. He found new reasons every single day to hate Mark Ford Brady, to be thankful his name was 'Goren' instead. This was yet another, just more to add to an agonizingly long list.

He fired off this latest knife in Dana's back and forced himself to simply sit at the computer and wait for her reply. If it took forever, he'd wait in the library until then.

The only obligations he would fulfill was to the Slayers he was being asked to train and to Xander and/or Dana, nothing and no one else.

_...Take my hand for tender, I am tortured - ever tortured..._

Scully sat in her office, in the corner on the floor, staring up at the emails Bobby Goren had sent her over the past day and a half. She wanted to rail and scream and call him a liar, but...when she'd called her mother from one of the untraceable cell phones Bobby had sent herself and Mulder in the mail the previous week, they'd finally admitted she was adopted.

They'd decided not to tell her, nor Bill, Melissa, or anyone else that Dana, herself, was adopted. It certainly had explained some...

Scully clenched her eyes shut, forcing herself not to sob aloud. She forced them back open and bit her lip as she stared at the open message on her computer screen.

She _did_ know Bobby, know that unlike his older brother, Frank, he'd never do anything like this - take advantage of her emotions or her sense of pity to...to what? He had to know how much this was going to hurt, he'd gone through it first. Scully had consoled him, herself, as he'd talked to herself and Mulder about it after Alex's death only a few short months ago.

He honestly believed what he was telling her about their parentage, that their biological father was a serial killer named Mark Ford Brady and that they had a younger brother from the now-destroyed town of Sunnydale in California named Alexander Harris.

Bobby had done some extensive profiling of the bastard since he'd gotten his and - Bobby had said the youngest's name wasn't what he went by, that everyone called him 'Xander' and that he'd been born in September 1980, nineteen years and a month and some days after Bobby, himself, and around sixteen years and seven months after herself - his brother's results back and added it to what he'd already deduced about the son of a bitch.

That Brady preferred a pattern of devoutly religious women and girls, followed by lapsed believers of both sexes. He'd definitely had an obsession with the idea of the purity of women, defiling them, and then finding men or boys who'd gone against all of that and forcing them to 'atone' for their (his, really) 'crimes'.

Normal human beings to play Jesus for him.

God, she realized, if Mulder's own fathers hadn't been so obsessed with him, he might have fit Brady's own profile and suffered the fate of who knew how many men and women?

She could only be thankful that, from what Bobby said in what Dana was certain was a terribly difficult email for him to write, that Teena Mulder had been saved by her own flaws. Her infidelity to Bill Mulder with CGB Spender keeping her from suffering the same fate as...possibly Dana's own biological mother.

God...

Dana felt her stomach clench and honestly hoped she didn't vomit but, at the same time, almost couldn't care if she did.

She was already angry with herself for taking that cheap shot at Bobby's sanity, what with knowing his worries about it. The least she owed him was to...

Dana let out a breathy sob, the tears finally spilling. The least she owed Bobby was the benefit of the doubt that he was possibly right and wasn't losing touch with reality. She, at least, could accept asking to see...Xander on a webcam and meeting him face to face.

Sighing shakily, Dana began writing another more recalcitrant email, apologizing for calling him crazy and asking if it was possible that Alexander - _Xander_, Bobby had specified that Xander didn't answer to his full name. She could only guess why at the moment, but that wasn't what was important.

Sniffling unconsciously as tears began to cloud her eyes, Dana wrote her reply and then pulled out her oh-so-useful phone to call Mulder.

Wiping her face with the back of her hand, she tried her hardest to regain some composure before Mulder could pick up the phone. As always, however, Mulder snatched it up before the second ring had finished, her name an urgent gasp of concern on his lips.

"Scully..."

Bobby lay on his back on one of the tables in the library, awaiting both Dana's second response and Xander's return. Breathing deeply with his eyes closed, he remembered what now seemed an age or more ago when Alex would have tapped his foot to get his attention or Deakins would have jarred him out of his jumbled ball of thought/string - this scenario leading to that one, his mind detached from his body as he thought his way through who did what with whom - and asked him if he had any _glaring insights_ (he distinctly remembers Deakins asking him about that with the Van Acker case very early on)...

Bobby sat up abruptly and trained his eye on the ceiling. Exhaling carefully, he pulled out his cross, shield of St. Michael, and Alex's shield, and blinked as his eyes stung.

Was he praying? Yes, he was. Alex had said - it was during the St. Justin's case - that the Catholic Church would have loved to baptize him and he'd told her they'd've been too late. He was lapsed. She should have known, she'd said.

So what now? What now, when the words, the Expiation - begging God to help him...help him what? He was so confused, but the words kept coming and he muttered them dutifully, his mind taking him back to the confessional booth and his white robes over black, the incense and olive oil, the simply _clean_ smell of the church, itself, that was different from a hospital in that it cleaned the soul and not the body.

He prayed and forgot the room around him as he toed off his shoes and brought his legs up underneath his chin.

_"...Full of - "_

Bobby's eyes snapped open as he realized he wasn't alone, his hand going to his gun before he realized it and raising it, cocking it and aiming it at - Angel.

Angel, who gave it a contemplative look before bringing eyes that matched Bobby and Xander's own in color if not pain. He realized he'd never be able to truly contemplate the burden the Champion had to live with - that they all did - but that wasn't a salient point at this time.

Slowly, Bobby lowered his gun, knowing perfectly well it'd have no effect on the very old vampire, much less have any use at all. Demons weren't felled by bullets anyway, but this one he wouldn't shoot, regardless. This one - and Spike - wanted so dearly to pay for his sins.

Who would Bobby be to even attempt to deny him the chance, even if Angel, himself, felt that an impossible goal. The only reason Buffy didn't object to his gun in the first place was its sentimental value and because he swore never to even aim at anyone on their side of things.

Bobby swallowed and forced himself to watch Angel mirroring his movements, even as they burned him and thin wisps of the pungent smoke of the damned curled off of him as though he'd just returned from the fires of Hell, themselves.

_"O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee, and I detest all my sins, because I dread the loss of Heaven, and the pains of Hell; but most of all because I love Thee, my God, Who art all good and deserving of all my love. I firmly resolve, with the help of Thy grace, to confess my sins, to do penance, and to amend my life. Amen."_ they said in unison, performing the sign of the cross and Bobby kissing the cross his mother had given him and Angel miming doing the same with an invisible cross.

Intent must mean more than Bobby had ever known because when Angel pulled his hands away from his mouth, all were blistered and burned.

Bobby blinked, tears falling from his eyes and he pulled out his handkerchief to wipe them away. "You've always believed," he whispered, taking in Angel's pained face. "Even when you were soulless - the whole point of your anger, your emptiness - you've been in Hell your whole life. It's where you think you'll always belong.

"You don't know why they brought you back, but you think that because they were forces of darkness that they've been preparing you for something. And you think that because you betrayed God in such ways - that you deserve whatever they've got to throw at you."

Bobby was profiling Angel, he knew it. He never intended to, at times like these. He'd even profiled Mark Ford Brady, in the moments after Brady had revealed what he had. He didn't need to profile his mother. Forty, plus, years of doing so rendered that irrelevant.

Angel's already pale face was death incarnate, but he nodded regardless. "Yes," was all he said in response. "May God forgive me."

Bobby bit his lip, knowing Angel didn't expect anything of the sort. "My...my stepfather was Jewish..."

"Your surname," Angel agreed quietly and Bobby nodded tracing his fingers along Alex's shield and asking both her and God to help him through this, for her to be God's sword in his hand.

"My mother was a devout Catholic, though...I was, once. Once upon a time, God was my only friend. I attended services regularly because it was like getting - getting to speak to..."

"A confidante," Angel whispered. Bobby nodded, more tears coming to his eyes. Angel understood completely.

"I even attended synagogue a few times with my - stepfather...that was...I don't know how to describe it. I used to believe that God was...intangible. I could touch this table, lean against a wall, see through the darkness when my mother had another psychotic break - she, uh - "

But Angel only nodded and instantly Bobby froze.

"When they returned your soul..."

Angel's own eyes closed, remembering. "I remember speaking to Darla..." His voice was but a faint whisper, but in the overwhelmingly silent library, Bobby could hear it clearly. He had an Irish brogue - it was faint, but it was there. "She thought I was playing some sort o' game. _We've drunk and killed fer how long now? 140-odd years. We've drunk them all up an' they're all dead...Funny. Ye would think with all the - people I've maimed - an' killed I wouldn' be able ter remember every - single - one."_

"Angel!" Bobby snapped, recognizing a break with reality with long-practiced ease and trying to coax Angel back to the present. He'd told Alex he'd had lots of practice, after all.

Angel blinked and swallowed convulsively. "Thank you."

Bobby sniffled, shaking his head slightly. "It's...it's what I do. You're lost because Buffy's not here right now. Giles had to go to Lithuania with her and you can't bear to go anywhere near there, so you stayed here. But its proximity. It's digging up old memories for you, whether you like it or not and Buffy's not here to keep you grounded."

Angel blinked some more, tears of his own trailing down his face. Bobby tried not to flinch when he noticed they were bloody. "It's...been a long time since I've had...trouble...staying grounded, as you say. But ever since Buffy and I...became whatever we are - "

"Acolytes - angels, for lack of a better term."

Angel ignored the interruption, only nodded, "I...when I'm not around her, it's...sometimes it's like I'm in hell again - sometimes it's like when I first received my soul...sometimes it's like when my father and I fought and I tried so hard to be the son he wanted, but I couldn't because I didn't even know what that was.

"He expected so little of me - why rise above that? Buffy says - and the Powers, apparently, before her - through other channels - that I did a long time ago...but I can never seem to agree. I can, sometimes, when I have a plan and everything depends on me doing what I always thought I was supposed to - die in that alley...but then I don't and I'm confused all over again. I keep having to find my way and no one's ever going to give me directions. The Powers are just a choir of angels...they're not..."

Bobby nodded, able through - as he'd said - long hours and years of practice to divine what Angel was truly trying to say. "You keep getting lost and without your Slayer, you can't remember your reasons to find the right way."

Angel shuddered, "You don't know me...why do you know me?"

Bobby laughed emptily, "For one, I've read about you - what you became after the demon evicted your soul from your body and took over. Plus, I've heard so many things about what you became afterward - they're not in the archives, of course, because the old Watchers had no idea. Your souled self is almost purely legend except that we're both standing here.

"For two, my mother was paranoid schizophrenic and aside from my brothers - I had an older brother named Francis, he was murdered - you're the only one I plan to tell that and only because it's important. Spike didn't have to deal with nearly as much as you. To come back from that took appalling strength of character and - please let me finish."

Angel had been on the verge of interrupting Bobby, but reluctantly pursed his lips, more tears - clear this time - falling from his eyes even as he forced himself not to malign his own body and actions.

"And say nothing of the fact that you've already been to Hell and back, you've sacrificed more than almost anyone we know to save the two people you love more than anything on Earth. It's hard for you to see any of that and what's funny to me is that if Alex were here she'd probably be trying to tell me the exact same thing.

"My younger brother may have helped to damn you again, but I assure you I will never do the same. I...what right would I have? If you didn't deserve to be an angel, your name would be just a..."

Bobby tilted his head and considered Angel, clearly imagining the wings this being likely had to those who could truly _see..._

"Your name is not a joke. It's a title. I know you've only just met me and that you and my brother have a long, sordid past of betrayal on his part and you thinking you deserve it so why complain...but..."

Bobby gritted his teeth slightly and steeled himself. "The only two people who ever called me by my full name were my mother and stepfather. Well, four. My priest, when we went to Mass - the rabbi when my father took me and my older brother to synagogue infrequently. Xander and I have an agreement about only using our nicknames, but - that - that doesn't seem right here. It doesn't feel right. I can't explain it. You don't feel like a demon to me - "

Angel darted forward before Bobby could say anything else, his game face fully apparent, his eyes glowing golden and a growl in his throat.

Bobby breathed deeply and concentrated on the fear he could feel emanating from Angel despite the menace he attempted - and did to a great extent - to exude. It was as if Bobby could see himself in this ancient being, everything he was afraid he'd become within his own mind right before him.

"You're schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder made manifest," Bobby breathed softly, unwilling to flinch away from Angel or give any other credence to the doubts and fear that poured off this _man_ in waves so thick Bobby thought he could feel them rippling through his clothing like wind. He breathed deeply. "And I'm not afraid of you because I know perfectly well that you would never hurt me. Most - "

Angel backed away, his human countenance slamming back onto his face in expression of shock and disbelief. Bobby ignored it and continued.

"Most schizophrenics aren't violent - " he'd said this all before. "Sometimes you are."

He'd never said this part, it had never applied...

"Only to protect those you love - even your demon, Angelus, he would die before he'd allow The Slayer to come to harm. She belongs to him, he feels, just as the same is true for you and Buffy. You and Connor, your only son. No matter how many times you tell either of them that you need to die, they won't just let you. One of them will always be there and both will always know when something has happened to you, just as you do for them."

"You're not a normal human," Angel breathed falsely, his eyes wide as he looked Bobby up and down and Bobby forced himself not to fidget under the scrutiny.

"I never was. I'm the son of a serial killer and rapist, even though I never knew it. I have two siblings because of that monster, one of whom you know extremely well."

"Xander told us earlier," Angel sighed, blinking again, still trying to get an understanding of this stranger and becoming frustrated when he couldn't. "He - Xander said his name was - "

"Mark Ford Brady," Bobby ground out, his hands fisting at his sides.

"You met him before he was executed. You worry you're like him - like my Other..."

"I have reason, don't I?"

"No," Angel snapped, flinging his hands outward. "You just said as much to me. Why would anything be any different for someone who's only ever tried to help people?"

Bobby raised an eyebrow and Angel gave a dark laugh, narrowing his eyes, "Look at me."

Bobby was terribly tempted to disobey, but the sudden tingling on his chest caused him to look down. His cross and shields were tugging forward toward Angel, a tiny yank then release, then the same again.

"How are you doing that?" Bobby asked, not taking his eyes off his lifelines.

"That's not me," Angel denied calmly. "I can do some magick, but I'm not a warlock or a sorcerer. I'm just a balancing demon, mental disorder made flesh as you were so able to point out."

"No. You're an angel and an acolyte of God and..." Bobby petered off when he realized what was happening. Finally, he gave in following his cross and shields until he and Angel were but a foot apart.

Angel frowned before his face became one of surprise again. "You're a Seer."

"What?" Bobby froze, blinking yet and still.

"You're a Seer, like me - like...Drusilla. Caleb called Xander The One Who Sees, but - it was...you're way more powerful than he is. You can See without even thinking about it. Like her and..."

"Like you?" Bobby asked, his voice trembling now. "Is that a good or a bad thing?"

Angel chuckled now, casting a glance downward at the floor beneath them. "I really wouldn't know. I recall - things have happened, sent us to alternate realities and I can't help but remember those things and times no matter how much it'd probably help me to forget...but that's my...curse? Gift? I can't forget, I'll never forget. I couldn't even...well, I want to, but I don't...I don't know. The point is I recall Cordelia sent us to an alternate reality once where Doyle - I assume you know who he is?"

At Bobby's reluctant nod, Angel gave his own, though far more affirmative. "I received the visions, myself, when he died. When a Seer sees too much, becomes too mired in what has happened, what could happen - what will..."

Bobby's eyes widened in astonishment, "You were driven insane - you developed the illness you represent."

Angel gave Bobby a mixture of a smile and a frown. "I remember it so clearly - I even remember when I went to another of the Acolytes - they didn't have mortal bodies, these - and tried to beg them to give me the visions because I'd be strong enough to hold them and Cordelia...they were killing her. She truly wasn't - wasn't strong enough, in body, though her mind and soul were ironclad, I'll tell you that. It wasn't her fault, but bearing them was her choice.

"I tried to make it mine, but they refused. It had to be her choice. She decided, as a compromise, she'd become part demon to hold the visions and keep them from destroying her from the inside out. Unfortunately, no one knew what demon decided she'd share her body with it. Everything in me blames me for her pain, for my son's pain - but his mother, she was my Sire...she came back to this plane - Darla shares Connor's soul to this day...she finally reminded me what my name means. And, true to it, I've never been able to stray from it."

"You're Irish - the Irish traditionally gave very literal names."

Angel nodded. "Protector." Angel gave a lost sort of chuckle. "I can't not, even when I try - sooner or later...Just like Buffy can't just _stop_ being the Slayer. We've both tried to run away from what we were supposed to do. I allowed a Thesulac demon to destroy a hotel full of people because someone I'd trusted betrayed me and - well, the result doesn't matter, I got everyone else killed.

"Buffy was given the choice between believing everything that's happened to her was real or a hallucination, a dream. She chose the latter. This is after she quit, twice. Her birth name was 'Elizabeth' and even though it was legally changed, she's still..."

"God's promise," Bobby breathed out. "You're still a Protector...I...wait, Robert means 'bright...'" Bobby ran a reluctant hand through his hair. "Oh, God, my name means 'bright fame'. Anyone in the City, sorry, New York would tell you...even if they didn't like me, they never disputed my solves. And I'm famous for them, no matter how uncomfortable that makes me." Bobby moaned slightly before giving his head a slight shake and moving onward, "Okay, Xander's name - 'Alexander' means - "

"Hey, wait - what?"

Xander was striding toward the both of them when Angel and Bobby turned back to the doorway to the library, which seemed to be the place they met most often now.

"We're just talking about destiny, little brother," Bobby said quietly, still thinking hard. "So far, our mothers didn't know they were being so accurate - well, Angel's mother did. The Irish name their children very pointedly. I'm pretty sure I was named after Senator Robert Kennedy, Sr., though. But your mother and Buffy's - well, Willow was raised Jewish and still practices privately even now, from what I can tell...I'm getting away from my point."

"Yeah, I'd noticed," Xander complained, glaring at Angel, who met his with a stony one of his own. "Deadb - "

"I thought you were trying to change," Bobby snapped, then, ducking in front of Xander and blocking Angel from his view. Bobby and Xander had exchanged childhood and adolescent stories at great length and Xander, himself, had said himself that his behavior was out of line, so this reversion to type stung more than a little.

Xander froze, his mouth tipping open and his eye widening slightly, before he backed away from Bobby a bit and stared.

"I..." Xander sank slightly, his shoulders slumping even as he frowned in resentment. "See, this is the problem with a big brother - and, apparently, sister, though -he - she thinks you're one stick short of a popsicle - popping up out of nowhere and saying you're supposed to be all kinds of family! They think they can just show up and start telling you what to do!"

Bobby stood silently, his face blank except for his eyes, which were burning with anger. "Fine."

Without another word, Bobby turned and walked into the stacks, from which Xander could hear him grabbing a particularly thick-sounding tome and settling down heavily on the floor.

Xander turned to Angel, expecting something along the same lines - for some reason, it wasn't like he didn't know what Angel would do, which was exactly what he did. Angel sighed, frowned darkly at Xander, and then left the library, the only sound he made being the doors opening and swinging shut.

Xander blinked, wondering where in the hells that had all come from. Bobby hadn't been anything but infinitely patient with him -

Angel, too, now that he very reluctantly thought about it - and treated him with both care and respect and...

"Bobby!" Xander called loudly, ignoring the glare some Junior Watcher directed at him and waited for Bobby to possibly respond. There was only silence. He started to run over to the stacks, but something in him halted his movement.

Shuddering even as he tried to breathe deeply, Xander placed his hands on his knees as he clamped his eyes shut, trying not to start crying again. Fuck, it was so different now when you knew damned well that whatever transpired had been your fault and yours alone. He could totally understand Buffy's urge to run away after sending Angel to Hell now.

Only that had been his fault, too.

Everyone had been very good at hiding their freaked-out'ed-ness the night before last when he'd gathered Giles, Buffy, Willow - again - Dawn, and Andrew, and told them about who his biological father had been, how Bobby had told him and the tests they'd had Willow run.

The fact that they apparently had a sister, too, and that Bobby knew her personally, but was, himself, freaked out by the idea of her - Dana, being his sister. That she'd worked for the FBI and been involved in some pretty fucked up shit that totally rivaled the goings-on in Sunnydale. That he and Bobby had emailed her and hopefully she wouldn't think they were out of their trees.

But Xander hadn't missed their ill-ease when walking past him. The only ones who hadn't been were Buffy and Dawn - what right did The Slayer or The Key have to get all freaked out just because his biological father was a murderer and a rapist?

"Hello, family is family," Dawn had said, her voice muffled through the hug she gave him. "And that bastard wasn't your family. None of them were. It's the ones you choose. Bobby is and Dr. Scully might be."

"Giles - "

"Is freaked out because he's being reminded of his past," Buffy had said very softly. "He'll get over it and maybe even apologize to Bobby for being such a prick when trying to recruit him. Now don't screw this up or _I'll_ kick your ass, Sergeant Hyena."

The serious tone in her voice and her reminder of other secrets he hadn't been nearly so quick to divulge - "at least you're learning", Andrew had said in what would have been a cheerful voice if he hadn't been shaking almost imperceptibly - had made him swallow and put him right on the path of returning here and getting things settled in some way with his big sister and brother.

And yet, here he'd done just that. Xander forced himself not to succumb to the urge to follow Angel out of the library and, instead, stationed himself in front of a computer, where he saw an email blinking with the words **BOBBY AND - APPARENTLY, XANDER...**.

Xander took a deep breath, wiping his sighted eye with the back of his hand, and clicked the envelope, opening Gmail in Firefox.

He was momentarily distracted by the arguments he remembered Willow having with her other AV Club buddies about Mac versus PC and, later on, fun-spirited debates between herself and Oz about the merits of Mozilla Firefox versus Internet Explorer. He'd never heard them get really geeked out about it, but apparently Bobby also preferred Firefox and Gmail and he was about to find out whatever the hell program it was.

Somehow, knowing where his big brother stood on the matter was both comforting and incredibly...well, the weight in his chest was only getting bigger, it seemed.

Xander grit his teeth. There wasn't anything left to do, that hecoul do, but click it. So why the hell was that so hard?

_...Am I hiding behind my doubts or are they hiding behind me...Closer to finding out it doesn't mean anything...I remind myself of somebody else..._

Bobby pressed his face into his knees, surprised at the sheer _hurt_ he was feeling right now and not even able to discern why. It wasn't like any of this was new. It wasn't as if any of it should have come as some sort of surprise. People didn't change overnight, he - of all people - should know that.

So why did he feel so angry? He even was angry with himself for snapping so waspishly at Xander, whom he knew had been very set in a certain pattern for over two decades, nearly three - it wasn't like he could just turn off a switch and be a newer, possibly better person at the drop of a hat.

Bobby unfolded the crinkled handkerchief in his hand and wiped his face with it, taking a deep breath and concentrating on staring at the German on the pages in the book he'd chosen. With the IWC's unlimited resources he could not only speak it now, but read it, as well as several other languages.

But he couldn't read this book because his eyes kept clouding over with tears.

_I've never seen you this upset,_ Alex's voice said in his head and Bobby's breath hitched as she appeared before him, glowing ethereally. She wasn't wearing a hospital gown and bandages or her dress blues, the way she had the last two times he'd seen her. Instead, she looked the way she did in most of his memories, but her face looked saddened.

For him.

Bobby's eyes widened as this iridescent Alex squatted down in front of him and sighed, "You knew this wasn't going to be an easy road, Goren, and no - before you think it, no one else can see me right now because out of everyone here, I only mattered to you. If we were at home, things might be different.

"I know about the talk you just had with Angel and you need to take some of your own advice sometimes because it's usually really good, you big dope. That one time with the body shots is probably the only time I'd say you were wrong, but only because our heads felt like they were going to split open all day at work the next day. God, hangovers - don't miss those."

Alex bit her lip and trailed a finger down the tie she had to know he was wearing just for her. "I do miss your body, though."

Bobby licked his lips and stared at Alex's finger, expecting to wake up any moment with wet sheets, but Alex rolled her eyes. "Is sex all men think about - okay, you want to know something? When you were talking to your idiot baby brother there, you were totally right. When I said it was 'too late', it was too late because you were in every fiber of me, Goren, and I in you and there wasn't anything but - this - "

And here Alex gestured to herself and Bobby felt his eyes close as a sob threatened again because he knew she meant death. But then a cool breath was thisclose to his face and Bobby's eyes shot open again only to find Alex sitting back and smirking. "I need your attention right, front, and center, Bright Boy - glad to know what 'Robert' finally means, by the way - and I aim to keep it. The only thing that was going to tear us apart was this - not some vengeful perp, not idiotic bureaucracy, not our asshole colleagues or that even bigger asshole Ross...'til death do us part, Bobby Goren.

"We may have only done it once and it may have been the result of a drunken, overdone mishap of a night, but I don't regret it for a second. Because you made me happy. You will always make me happy. I died happy because you were my last thought and I want you to know that. I want you to know that you were the reason I got up at the crack of 'why the hell am I awake' to go to some crime scene in the middle of 'holy hell, this damned traffic' to watch you poke around with bodies and...just be you.

"And I'll still be there, when you're training these girls to be the best Slayers they can be and live as long as they can because no one deserves an early death because some mystical force decided to give them a job they did or didn't want. And I know what you're about to say - "

Ethereal!Alex gently pressed an incorporeal finger to his mouth before wiping his wet face again and giving him a kiss on each cheek that dried his face within moments. "And had that drunken mishap of a night developed into something...beautiful and breathtaking, with ten fingers and ten toes and an IQ higher than the temperature at the earth's core - shush - "

Alex bit her grin back at Bobby's almost!correction and plowed onward. "And if things had gone the way they might have if...we couldn't have been partners anymore, then maybe we could have at least been parents and, you know what? Mark Ford Brady can burn in Hell. Is, as a matter of fact. I know you wouldn't want a front row seat, but at least tell Dana and Xander that. Give them some peace. Put their suspicions to rest.

"Also, tell your jackass little brother what his name means. The little jerk needs to learn to listen. But don't worry, he will - in time. For now, just do what you've been doing and be patient. It's what you're good at - besides creeping out green detectives and CSU techs."

Before Bobby could stop himself he was rolling his eyes but then he caught Alex's words before.

"We...you weren't joking? We had..."

Alex bit her lip again, nodding, and Bobby felt his insides drop out. "It's not fair," he heard himself saying before he could stop himself. Then he bit out, "Of course it's not fucking fair. It's life. If life were fucking fair, I wouldn't eve - "

"If you finish that sentence, I will make sure The Slayer gives you a nice _haircut_ with her Scythe."

Bobby was stupefied at the frigid, completely truthful tone of Alex's voice. "Don't you dare, Robert Goren. Don't. You. Dare."

Bobby shuddered again, this time his wide eyes trying to convey everything he felt to Alex without words. She seemed to know anyway.

Sure enough, tears slipped out of her eyes and disappeared before his own. "I didn't want us to get married."

Alex gave him a small smiled, nodding, "I know. It would have taken us away from each other. Most don't understand that and it's okay, because we have those that do."

Bobby sighed, "Frank didn't tell me I was an uncle. I...I feel spiteful. If - if things had turned out the way you say and we'd had a baby, then would I have told him?"

They both knew the answer before Bobby finished his eyes' trek upward from Alex's _hand_ on his. "You would have told Donnie's mother, you would have let Donnie see his cousin. Let Michael meet his cousin-brother. You certainly would have told your mom."

Bobby snorted, "I told Dale Van Acker that she hated all my girlfriends but she didn't kill any of them because she wanted me to be happy. She...she thought you were my girlfriend, you know. She never believed that we worked together. 'That Alexandra's far too pretty to be a policewoman...'"

Bobby was biting back laughter now, though tears still came and Alex wasn't bothering to hide her own grin. "Score one for me..."

"Has anyone ever told you you're smug?"

"Says Detective Bobby Goren!" Alex said incredulously. "You and Fin would wipe the floor playing ball with Lewis and he'd beg me to be on his team instead of Mulder because half the time Mulder kept feeling you and Lewis up even though it earned him a personal foul every time. Fin threatened to shoot him after that first time..."

Bobby rubbed his hand over his mouth, smothering his own laugh. "I have a brother in law...who's sexually attracted to me, that's...that's - "

"Life. Just be happy you get to see the look on his face when he realizes it'd be to like you anymore..."

"Aw, Alex, it'll break his heart."

"Mulder has Dana with his greedy ass. She should toss him to the curb."

"Not gonna happen. How'd...how'd you coming here and us talking - how did that turn into who likes who and how who likes which is now a social taboo who happen?"

"Dear God, classic Goren sentence, there. You're lucky I know you so well. Because, like I just told you, Bobby - that's life."

_...Never been so lonely, never felt so good...Can't be the only one misunderstood..._

Bobby's eyes snapped open and he found himself asleep against the shelves, the book he'd been reading across his chest. He whimpered, immediately bringing his hand to his mouth and stifling yet another sob.

"God, I miss you, Alex. Van Acker called Lois his bunny...what do I call you?"

_I'm sure you'll think of something. You always do, genius._

Bobby slowly got to his feet and gently closed the book before leaving the stacks to find Xander hunched over a computer, reading what he assumed was Dana's reply.

"Does she still - "

"I'm sorry," Xander interrupted, shoving himself away from the terminal, his face pale and his hands fidgeting by his sides. "If you want to be friends with Angel, that's none of my business and I'm an adult and should act like one and recognize him for the Champion he is instead of the villain I want him to be."

Bobby blinked, "Wow. Uh, thanks. Is that Dana's reply?"

Xander exhaled and nodded, gesturing grandly at the chair they'd each vacated. Bobby slid in front of the computer and quickly read through the email.

"She wants to meet me," Xander said nervously, despite the fact that Bobby could read her words for himself. "I - what if she decides I'm an idiot and - "

"Will you shut up with that?" Bobby said calmly, though his patience was beginning to fray. "You were an A student all through your high school career, Xander. You were in AP classes with Willow and Buffy and while the two of you weren't up to Willow's own performance, you never dropped below A's in normal classes. You're not stupid and I don't want to hear that out of your mouth ever again, is that clear?"

Xander blinked, "But - but I didn't even get accepted to - "

"You didn't _apply_, numbnuts," Bobby said shortly, figuring adopting a militarial attitude was the only way Xander was truly going to listen. "You don't know what you would have done. Buffy applied to the one that was closest to the Hellmouth because it was practical and convenient.

"Willow and Oz accepted UC Sunnydale for the same reason. But you gave up on yourself before you even got out of the gate and I'll tell you right now, if you continue with this 'I'm a moron' attitude, you're going to get treated like one, is that clear?"

Bobby finished off his minor tirade with as good a glare as he could give and Xander froze, air audibly sucked into his lungs even from where he stood several feet away. "Yes...I'm not calling you 'sir'."

Bobby rolled his eyes. "That's not necessary. I'm not your C.O. If anybody is, it's Giles, but that's not the point. I did tell Dana you were only going to be here for a short period of time - "

"Actually, I, uh, took some time off - or, well, Buffy commanded me to. She said 'no buts'. But I'll be here for another month."

Bobby took that into consideration before revising his own reply, apparently, and finally sending the email.

"From the looks of it," Bobby said, finally turning all the way around. "Buffy sent Dana an email, herself, offering to escort both she and Mulder here by plane and everything else will be settled when they get here. But you knew that, so tell me what you're upset about now."

Xander fiddled with the lapel of his shirt before giving Bobby a lost look of his own, "I've never been an uncle before. And...um, Dana had a daughter and a son? And...I mean, I know you probably won't like it, but I went over to see if you were willing to talk to me, but you were asleep and you were muttering. Well, not even muttering. It was pretty clear you were talking to...to Alex-Who-Was-Basically-My-Sister-In-Law. And that's not even weird, let me tell you. But the point is that...okay, let me just say this before I chicken out. Did you guys sleep together one night and she got pregnant?"

Yep, still an A+ in AP Babbling.

Now it was Bobby's turn to inhale forcefully, feeling the blood drain from his body and pool in his shoes. "Apparently," he whispered.

Xander ran a hand through his hair, glancing away from Bobby's distress before nodding, "Okay. Okay. Um - our niece, ah, Dana mentioned her - what was her name?"

"Emily," Bobby whispered again, his mouth twitching and his eyes blinking back yet more tears. It seemed that was all he'd done lately, but he didn't want it to end because he didn't want to go back to feeling nothing like he had when he was suspended. Never again.

"A-and our nephew - his name?"

"His name is - was - might still be - William - it was Mulder, Jr. He should be about ten now. He was in foster care the last time I saw him because it was too dangerous for either he or his parents to be together."

"You look doubtful."

"Well, I have resources now. I have a couple of nephews to find and Willow said she'd help, but this...I don't know what takes precedence, but the fact that Dana hasn't even met you means something."

Xander nodded, "Well, then, let's go to work."

And, with that, slowly, the brothers left the library for Bobby's apartment.

**END**

_I've never seen you this upset,_ Alex's voice said in his head and Bobby's breath hitched as she appeared before him, glowing ethereally. She wasn't wearing a hospital gown and bandages or her dress blues, the way she had the last two times he'd seen her. Instead, she looked the way she did in most of his memories, but her face looked saddened.


End file.
